The Pulpit Commentary — 2 Chronicles — Section 333

Ho flo.grantly bre11ks, 11nd teaches the breaking of, the first two of the ever-venerable ten comm11ndments-th11t vital Heaven-gro.ven foundation-code of legislation of his kingdom, So.crilege, idolo.try, aud each most heathenish practice and rite of un-"no.tural religion" he honours e.nd follows. He gets as far as it is possible to get from "fearing " and "loving" e.nd "serving " the Lord God of his fathers "with all the heart, and mind, and soul, and strength." For a young man, for any man to forsake the right model, the one Example, is to leave himself to pick among ma.ny, uncertain in every direction, except in the one certainty of all being wrong! One only safe right rule is ours to follow; "If the Lord be God, follow him" (1 Kings xviii. 21). Examples abound, but absolute safety and rightness can be found in one only. II. NEGLECTED WARNING. The warning which Abaz neglected, with a. long succes- 11ion, to say nothing of all those who ma.y have gone before, was not merely warning v,ritten, preached loudly and earnestly and with prophefs voice proclaimed, but it was that practical warning, the ultimatum of all, the warning of consequences. Defeat, and the captivity of many of his people at the hand of the King of Syria; defeat, and the captivity of many of his people at the hand of the King of Israel; the slaying of his son, of the governor of his house, and of the man that was "the second to him in the kingdom; "-all these judgments, offering to bring closer and closer home to him a.nd to his conscience the facts of the case, of his own sins, and of the consequences of those sins, he is blind to, or, not blind, he nevertheless disregards them to the very point of infatuation. But, again, not only are the practical warnings of "wrath" thus set at nought. Providences of mercy compete with those of "wrath." In one of the most remarkable and pathetic passages of a.11 history, startling us by its lifelike a.nd more than drama.tic reality-a. very monograph of pathos-seven verses (9-15) here record this providence, They tell us how, by the side of Judah's king, who refuses to give ear, to repent, or to learn, "certain of the heads of the children of Ephraim in Samaria," listen attentively to the remonstrance a.nd teaching of the Prophet Oded, are open to the impression of the justness of wha.t he says, see in a. moment the truth of things for themselves, and reason without delay with the people, producing salutary convictions in them; and then, even with the atoning addition of a.ll tenderest ministra• tions (ver. 15), lead back their captives of Judah to Jericho, to the shade of tha.t "city of palm trees," a.nd to the yet kinder shelter of "their brethren." What a. practical message that was for a hardened heart like that of Ahaz ! Wha.t an a.ppea.1 and suggestion for the better feelings, if any, of J uda.h's king! But this too, this species of warning was in vain! III. IMPROVED ADVERSITY TO THE GREATER INIQUITY, AND TO THE REAPING OF GREATER PUNISHMENT AND DEEPER DEGRADATION FOR HIMSELF AND NATION, The Edomites have successfully "smitten" him; the harrying incursions of the Philistines are ever on him; they take village after village, and also so take them, tha.t they a.re safe in taking up their a.bode in them, for "they dwelt there" (ver. 18). Aha.z does not repent, and does not for a moment" seek to the Lord." The strickenness of sin is on him; the persistence in evil is bis disease; the fa.ta! aggravation of folly and infatua- tion of obstinacy cloud his brain, eclipse his reason," make gross" his heart. He seeks to the King of Assyria, snd bribes him with the sar.red things of the house oi the Lord, with the precious things of his own palace, with the robbed things of his princes. And that king takes a.II, but gives no help-" he helped him not" (ver. 21); mocks his defencelessness; makes sport of his supplications to him! To one deeper depth, m his deafened despair, he descends. Ahaz vows for his own the gods of those who "smote him" (ver. 23). His logic is that the house too of "the gods of the kings of Syria" may possibly prove a. house divided against itself I It was a. last, cruel, hapless resort! The refuge waR the refuge of ruiu-" the ruin of him, and of all Israel" (ver. 23). He ends all by entreating for his memory loathing unqualified. He hacks to pieces the collected "vessels of the house of God;" but shuts up (by just so much too late) "the doors of the house" itself; rears every wild altar; profanes with "high places every several city of Judah " to burn there the "incense of abomination; " excludes his own bones from the sepulchres of the best of his ancestors; and leaves us one more fearful lesson, that none and nothing make S\.l sure a mock as sin itself makes of the " fool, who makes a mock" at it! 336 THE SECOND BOOK OF THE CHRONIOLES. [oH. xxvm.1-27,